


The Jade Mirror

by Silex



Category: Original Work
Genre: Demons, Fantasy, Gen, Magic, Rituals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 08:27:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20061004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silex/pseuds/Silex
Summary: Matthias had only wanted to recover some bit of treasure from the ships that had sunk off the peninsula centuries ago. He'd never meant to summon a demon as powerful as the Keeper of the Drowned Dead.





	The Jade Mirror

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ruis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruis/gifts).

Matthias shuddered as the storm raged on, waves crashing against the cliffs on which the lighthouse stood. Even after all these years as lighthouse keeper the fury of the elements never ceased to amaze him. This stretch of coast was known for being especially deadly and there were times when he wondered if it was natural or if the waters were cursed.

If that were the case he wondered how long the curse had been there.

Despite the warning the lighthouse gave countless ships had still met their ends dashed against the rocky outcroppings that, during high tide, were almost hidden.

Almost.

The danger was always there though, the powerful currents offshore of the peninsula seemed hungry, pulling ships in that should have, by all rights, made it safely home. The lighthouse was a token gesture at best, a warning that often came far too late, especially on nights like this one.

There were countless legends to explain why the peninsula was so dangerous, why so many ships had been claimed by the waters off shore, but none of the explanations satisfied Matthias and seeking out the truth was something he no longer had the desire for. He had the time and the means, but the drive had long since left him.

When he was younger he might have, he had been a practicing arcanist back then rather than just preforming a few spells to keep him in the good graces of the locals. He’d been inquisitive and determined, seeking power for its own sake, managing to make quite a name for himself in some circles, before he abandoned it all and fled into comforting obscurity. Eventually he supposed that someone as ambitious as he had been would see through the wards around the lighthouse and find him, but he hoped that day was still a long way off.

After all, any who knew of who he had been also knew beyond all doubt that he was yet another victim of the waters and his own arrogance. Besides there was a long enough stretch of time between his supposed death and a haunted looking man, aged prematurely by unknown horrors, showing up and taking the job of lighthouse keeper. A job that no one else had wanted thanks to the waters having grown increasingly ominous in recent years.

His ambitions had been what had brought him here in the first place and what had brought him back in the end had been something entirely different, the abandonment of it all. He would die here, he knew that much to be true, but what would come after?

Despite the merrily cracking fire in the hearth, he drew his cloak more tightly around him.

It was the storm that made him feel this way, made him think about his own mortality and the price he would eventually have to pay for his ambitions.

One would think that it would be the clear calm days that made him remember, given that it had all happened on a halcyon summer day, the waters so calm as to hide their true nature, but those deceitful days brought with them a sense of peace, that the violence the sea was capable of was fleeting whimsy, rather than something constantly lurking just below the surface.

When the sun was high in the sky and the waters were like a mirror he should have looked upon them with dread, but he didn’t.

Because it was the storms that reminded him of what he had done, the mistakes he had made.

After all it was a storm that had started it all, just not one during his lifetime.

Nearly seven hundred years ago the first fleet of ships to return from the far western jungles had sunk off shore from the peninsula. Their exact cargo was unknown, the few men who survived having stories of the wonders and horrors of the jungles - great cats that lured the unwary to their claws and fangs with plaintive cries and promises of wealth to any who could help them, giant, golden lizards that walked like men and worshiped the sun, two headed dogs and birds so large that their wings blotted out the sun when they took flight, but precious little to say about what they had brought back. Gold coins in strange shapes, gems the size of a man’s fist, exotic creatures and the standard sorts of things that people claimed could be found in the western jungles were believed to have been a small part of the cargo, but rumors eventually began to spread of there being far more than that.

It was certainly true that strange things washed up on the shores from time to time.

Since then there had been plenty of other trips to the western jungles and enough of them had returned successfully that the singing cats had been confirmed. Matthias had actually seen the pelt of one of them, a hypnotic mish-mash of rosettes and stripes that, even lifeless, had the ability to captivate the unwary. The two headed dogs also existed and enough of them had been brought back and then bred that they were a popular status symbol among the wealthy now.

The tribes of lizards and giant birds remained elusive, but enough other things were found that they remained believable.

The magic that had been brought back, that was what was most impressive. Impossibly made masks that let the wearer walk in dreams, glowing water that would cure a sick man and strike dead a well one, but instantly curdled into vile mud the moment it was exposed to light. Wood was brought back and carved into wands that grew in power along with their wielder, and there were curving fangs that neutralized any poison, the beast to which they belonged never having been.

With such monsters and wonders to be found in the jungles attempts had been made to settle there, but those settlements had all vanished without a trace, or, in one case everything, including the people, had been grown over with living wood.

Each new discovery and bit of treasure brought back added to the tales of what treasures must have been lost in the waters maddeningly close to shore, but impossible to reach.

Countless wizards had tried their hand at retrieving something and either came back emptyhanded or in no condition to speak of their failures.

Matthias hadn’t seen it himself, but knew that the Wizards’ College in Whiteoak had, as a warning to those who might strive for what was beyond them, the twisted skeleton of one of the men who had returned from trying to retrieve treasure from the sunken ships. He had managed to make it all the way back to the College before finally drowning, or so they said. The body had been examined and his drowning had been the least exceptional thing about his body.

Given what he had seen Matthias firmly believe that a man could drown, or worse, on dry land.

He wished that he had seen the skeleton, maybe then he would have been more careful.

Except he had been careful.

He hadn’t attempted to sail out on the waters himself, or to open a portal that he might reach through. Reaching into the unknown was a good way to lose a hand, or pull back one that wasn’t your own.

Summoned creatures sent out to the wrecks never returned and all divination attempts, as well as basic navigation attempts failed in the area where the ships went down.

So he hadn’t simply summoned some wispy thing of aether, nor had he bound a creature of the waters to his will, rather he tried something far bolder.

He had engaged in a painstaking, month long ritual, the site of which was a small cave along the shore. Hidden from the curious eyes of the locals and only accessible during low tide it had been perfect for his purposes. The thought of the magic he might gain, the secrets he might find held him enthralled every bit as much as the enormity of the ritual he had prepared. To be able to claim such an accomplishment and then show unknown and unknowable treasures as proof would make him a legend. Failure at any point would kill him, but the ritual had been performed by wizards with far less skill than he.

On the night of a full moon, the floor of the cave flooded so that he was standing in water up to his knees, Matthias completed the ritual and sealed his fate.

The candles he had lit all guttered out at once, as he’d known they would and it took his eyes several minutes to adjust to the flashes of blue-green light that shot through the water every time he moved.

Those lights also illuminated something floating in the water, drifting slowly towards him, despite the retreating tide.

In that moment, as the pale form moved towards him, he knew that he had succeeded.

He had called upon the Keeper of the Drowned Dead and the demon had responded.

Matthias first thought the thing floating towards him was a servant of the demon, some damned soul or perhaps a possessed corpse, but when it stood up stiffly before him and he saw the crown of fish bones and ship worms, the symbol of the Keeper of the Drowned Dead, upon its head he realized that he was mistaken.

The demon himself had answered his ritual.

It was a situation that demanded caution, certain protocols had to be followed when communing directly to demons rather than through a proxy. One misspoken word could have nullified the ritual and cost him his soul on the spot rather than at some point in the distant future, but he had said and done everything perfectly, even if the Keeper of the Drowned Dead never said a single word. The demon watched him with sunken black eyes, gray lips moving soundlessly in response to what he said and when Matthias made his demand the demon nodded once and walked out of the cave.

By that point the sun was rising and the water falling so that Matthias was able to leave the cold cave and sit in the sun to warm himself while he waited for the Keeper to return.

The pact he had made with the demon had been a simple one, for those were always the safest. The Keeper of the Drowned Dead would bring him a single relic from the wreck, something of great power, and in return he would perform a single task for the Keeper, something that was humanly possible complete in a single night. It was the usual arrangement in dealings with more powerful demons and was regarded as the safest. The only danger came from how smoothly such pacts could go, creating the temptation to make further agreements as the cost was always negligible compared to the benefits. It was in that manner that many powerful mages found themselves in the service of a demon, one night at a time.

At the time that night had been of little concern to him, especially on such a tranquil day, the water giving no hint of what lay beneath. Still as a millpond, it reflected the sky perfectly. The waves were little more than ripples against the shore and for a moment he had the completely irrational thought to stand up and wade into the sea, as though he might be able to swim to where the ships were and retrieve something from them himself.

In time the urge to follow the demon passed and eventually the Keeper of the Drowned Dead returned, arm outstretched, holding something as flat and smooth as the sea.

A hand mirror made of some waxy looking green stone, completely unblemished despite hundreds of years in the water. The only sign of the ravages of time was that the metal the frame had once held had fallen out, or maybe rotted away from the saltwater.

Except as Matthias peered at the intricately carved frame, the shifting images of fish and serpents, flowers and impossible beasts, cut to flow with the natural variations in the stone’s color, he started to feel that there had never been anything in the frame, that what he was looking at was the mirror in its entirety.

With that realization he was able to see.

Horrified at what the mirror revealed, he wrenched the mirror from the demon’s hands and threw it into the sea.

In response the Keeper smiled, his lips parted in a bubbling laugh, the first sound that Matthias had heard the demon make.

He ran from the thing, from the sea, and sought refuge in the small shelter he had made for himself amid the cliffs.

Shivering despite the warmth of the day he tried to explain away what he had seen in the mirror, that it had been a trick of the demon. The mirror didn’t show any truth, merely projecting thoughts of the one holding it, but what he had seen would be anathema to a creature of the cold and lightless depths. Perhaps the mirror showed the distant past or revelations from the land it had been made in.

Because if it showed the future, no matter how distant…

He couldn’t bring himself to complete the thought.

What the mirror showed could have been lies. Even with the most powerful of known magics such things were impossible.

Lost in misery, trying to rationalize what he had seen, Matthias failed to notice that he was no longer alone until he finally looked up and saw the Keeper of the Drowned Dead standing outside the door to his shelter, smiling.

The demon held out the mirror, offering it to him.

Against all logic hope welled up within him, that perhaps this time the mirror would show something different, he gazed into its surface.

The horrors remained, taking form instantly and growing more elaborate the longer he stared. There was a clarity to them now, elements that were almost recognizable as aspects of some spell, but twisted in ways that made them all the more unnerving for being almost familiar, like knowing a burned out building by its shape or seeing the funeral mask of someone you had known. If he stared long enough he might in time come to understand the spell.

If he stared at those horrors.

The temptation was so strong.

This time he threw himself into the sea.

Somehow he missed all the rocks below, not that it mattered. The impact of hitting the water below drove the breath from his lungs and the pull of the waves, like icy hands grasping his body, dragged him down. He tried to claw his way to the surface, suddenly desperate to live, but in the confusion of the crashing waves he could no longer tell up from down.

Flashes of white danced before his eyes, even as all else faded into blackness and water burned its way down his nose and throat.

His last thought had been that the Keeper had won, claiming him as one of the Drowned.

Waking up in complete darkness an unknown length of time later seemed to confirm this. The air was damp and stale, reeking of rotten seaweed and dead things. The echo of water dripping and lapping against rocks was a cacophony that nearly drowned out all thought. Something with many pointed limbs scuttled across his hand and he flicked it away with a shout.

The noise of his exclamation temporarily overcame out the sound of water and listening to the fading echoes he slowly began to make sense of his surroundings.

Where he was couldn’t possibly be the Keeper’s realm, it was cold and oppressively dark, but there was air to breathe and that he was breathing meant that he wasn’t dead, therefore couldn’t have been forfeit to the demon just yet.

He waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness and when that failed to happen he crawled forward cautiously on his hands and knees. Broken shells cut his palms and occasionally he would slip on something, but eventually he made sense of the confines he was trapped in. A small chamber, irregular in shape, roughly ten paces across where it was widest, with a pool of water off to one side.

There was seemingly no way in or out, though when he reached into the pool, an act of desperation when he failed to find anything else in the cave, he found that he couldn’t feel the bottom of it.

With no other way into or out of the cave as far as he could tell, it seemed that somehow, he had ended up there through the pool, be it having swum or been pulled there by currents. If that were the case it stood to reason that if he had made it to this place without drowning then he could make it back out.

All that was required was the courage, and if he could work one, some simple bit of magic to allow him to better endure the swim. Spells that would hasten his speed in the water or allow him to breathe in the sea were both dangerous in his situation, especially if undertaken in haste and without the proper mnemonics, but a little incantation to harden his resolve would be harmless.

Matthias began reciting the near meaningless words of the meditative exercise that was the beginning of the spell only to stop when he realized that he was no longer alone.

He couldn’t see them in the darkness or hear them over the sounds of the cavern, but he could sense them, a foreboding presence crouched, close enough to touch.

He almost reached out to them, sensed that they leaned forward, offering him the mirror.

Even unable to see the mirror’s face he felt the pull of it, the darkness swam with ghostly images similar to those on its unseen surface.

When he closed his eyes the images remained, filling his brain, disrupting his attempts at meditation.

The demon knew, Matthias realized, that the offering he had retrieved was something far too horrific to be desired. Though not renowned for his cunning, the Keeper of the Drowned Dead was as unrelenting as the waves lapping against the shore, eating away at the land one handful of sand at a time. The people of the islands had stories of how eventually all of the land would be washed away and there would be nothing but endless ocean remaining.

The Keeper of the Drowned Dead had driven him here so that he would take the mirror out of desperation or madness and then need to fulfill his part of the pact, some otherwise simple task that would be impossible to complete from the cave.

At the time Matthias didn’t consider the consequences of refusing to take the mirror, only knowing that the pact would remain unfulfilled and that he would be safe and free to think of a way to escape the situation he had placed himself in.

The simple answer of telling the demon to bring him something different would be devastating, that the thought had entered his mind proof that he wasn’t thinking clearly. Changing that nature of the agreement, requesting an additional item would leave the demon free to make a similar request of another task.

It was the dark, the oppressive, echoing confines of the cave that made it impossible to think clearly.

Struggling to calm his nerves Matthias determined that there was only one thing for him to do if he wished to reason his way out of things, and that was to escape the cave.

He was a strong swimmer, or so he liked to believe, enough so that he could travel the unknown distance. His life depended on it after all.

When he cautiously slipped into the water the Keeper made no attempt to stop him, and when, after taking a final deep breath he ducked under, he got no sense that the demon was trying to pursue him. Below the surface he nearly lost his nerve. What chance did he have of making it to the surface when the darkness was so complete that it was the same whether his eyes were opened or closed?

Yet what choice did he have? To return and accept the demon’s offering would be to doom himself.

Remaining calm was a struggle as he clawed his way through the darkness, clinging to the walls and roof of the narrow tunnel through the stone until he lost all sense of direction.

In the blackness he couldn’t even see the bubbles that escapes from his nose and lips, though he felt them, precious drops of air slipping away.

He could feel the water moving though, pushing and pulling, guiding him on what he hoped was the right path. Otherwise he would drown and…

No, he couldn’t think like that. If he did he would panic and then he truly would be doomed. He had to keep calm. If he had ended up in the cave he could escape, that was what he had to tell himself. If there was a way in there had to be a way out. That thought became a mantra as he continued through the darkness.

His eyes stung from the salt, that was how he knew that they were open when he reached out and felt nothing. Disbelieving, he hesitated, groping blindly for the next handhold.

There was none.

He’d escaped.

All that remained was getting to the surface.

Orienting himself to find which way was up took painfully long, by the end of which he could feel his lungs starting to burn. There was light above though and with it the thought of making it to the surface became real.

His arms and legs felt like lead as he frantically thrashed his way to the surface, the light fading as his lungs burned.

Bubbles streamed from his nose, rising up, passing him, as he struggled, grains of sand trickling through an hourglass.

Kicking with all his might, knowing true desperation for the first time, Matthias felt the last air slip from his lungs just as he broke the surface.

Laughing like a madman he paddled to shore and lay there on the pebbled beach for a long time, waiting for the sun to warm him and for exhaustion to fade before he forced himself to his hands and knees and took stock of his situation.

Judging by the sun it was late in the afternoon, meaning that his ordeal had taken far less time than he’d believed.

When he finally rose to his feet and looked around he recognized the stretch of beach he was on as one several miles from the site of his ritual.

It didn’t matter where he was, not when the sea and the Keeper of the Drowned Dead were still so close. In the distance, beyond the dunes he could see trees and beyond those trees he knew, there were mountains and cities.

Not daring to look back he began his trek inland, not stopping for several months.

Nightmares of the mirror and what he had seen in it began to fade and for a time he thought that he had managed to escape. Still, he kept hidden, afraid that if he drew any attention to himself that the Keeper of the Drowned Dead might come for him. It was impossible of course, the demon was tied to the sea and could not pursue him to such lengths, yet the nightmares of drowning lingered, filling him with dread such that even the smallest puddle was a source of dread. Storms were enough to send him running into the night like a madman, standing in the rain, head tilted upward to gaze upon the fury above.

Water would run down his nose, into his mouth as though the drops were trying to crawl into him, choking him.

The madness grew, dreams of the Keeper silently calling to him, wordlessly beckoning him to return.

Every pond and river held the fear of the Keeper, any body of water where anyone might once have drowned was a threat. At the same time he was drawn to those places.

Standing at the edge of a well, contemplating throwing himself down into the darkness as though there he might be able to escape, Matthias made his decision.

His not taking the mirror had allowed the Keeper to remain in the world, the bargain unfulfilled. The demon now stalked him and would torment him until death.

And so he returned to the sea, to the very shores where he had performed the ritual.

As he had expected, the Keeper was there waiting for him, laying in the shallows as though a dead thing until he approached close enough.

Slowly the Keeper rose to his feet, and held out his hands to Matthias.

This time the demon didn’t offer the expected mirror, instead his hands were overflowing with strange gold coins.

Matthias stared at the coins, wondering at the trick. Was it that he had asked for a single treasure and the coins were multiple, or was it that he had lost his chance at the mirror and their original bargain and that to take what was offered would be to make a deal on the Keeper’s terms?

In the end he refused the coins and took up residence as lighthouse keeper so that he might be close enough for the demon to stop calling to him and thus keep the nightmares at bay. All his time he devoted to trying to make sense of what he had done, if there was a way out of his deal.

There were times when he thought that there might be. Those were the times where he could look out at the sea and not need to fight back the urge to run to it. The demon seemed content to have him close, loosening his hold on Matthias’ mind enough to allow him some semblance of sanity.

Attempts at banishing the Keeper failed, the demon always returning, the incomplete bargain tethering the two of them together, providing the demon with the means of return.

Sometimes it took weeks, sometimes months, but the demon always came back to him, bringing some new offering. Treasures from sunken ships, pearls larger than any he had ever seen, their shapes and colors strange, again and again bits of things that resonated with magics he couldn’t understand and sometimes mundane things like shells and bones from unknown creatures.

When Matthias refused to accept the offerings the Keeper would leave them behind, carefully arranged, placed where they could be seen, there to tempt him to pick one up. He ignored the trinkets, the extravagant gifts from an undesirable suitor, and focused instead on living out his life.

If he lived a simple life, using small magics to help people, refusing payment and living meagerly, saying the right things and following humble rituals, speaking quiet prayers, there might come a time when the Keeper would fail to return. After all it was known that those who were faithful would be safe from all manner of evils.

Except that wasn’t how it worked and deep in his heart Matthias knew it.

The Keeper always returned, more gifts and each gift a reminder.

Matthias could pray all he wanted, live the trappings of a pious life, but there was no escaping what he had done.

The storms that came with the changing seasons washed up all manner of strange things, horrifying sea creatures that were never meant to see the light, wood and other things from the sunken ships and Matthias would throw back what he could, a ritual that had nothing to do with faith. Symbolic rejections of the demon he had called upon. Those things were safe to touch, for him to pretend to refuse because they were not directly from the demon.

It was all he could do to distance himself from the nightmares that came during the storms. How sometimes, not all the time, but often enough that the sky darkening and the winds picking up would fill him with dread, the demon would visit him during storms.

During those visits the Keeper of the Drowned Dead brought nothing. The demon would simply stand, or, if Matthias placed a chair out for him when the demon’s looming presence became unbearable, sit and watch him.

The Keeper never once spoke a word, simply smiling and following Matthias’ every move with his empty eyes.

Those eyes spoke volumes, reminding him that acting the part did not make him one of the faithful whom the gods protected, that rituals and prayers had to come from faith in those gods and it certainly wasn’t love or loyalty to any of the divine that motivated Matthias as he spoke and acted. It wasn’t the gods he thought of as he did good for futile and selfish reasons. His actions brought him no joy, all he felt was fear of what was to come.

All he did he did because of the Keeper and the demon knew.

There were times when he wondered if the gifts the demon brought him were an attempt at a bargain or if they were rewards for allowing it to linger in the world of mortals. Matthias tried to avoid it, but there were times when he heard rumors. Whole coastal villages vanishing during storms, strange creatures emerging alive from the depths to attack ships, strange cults springing up on remote islands.

Though the Keeper hadn’t spoken yet, Matthias knew there would come a time he did and when that time came the truths that the demon would reveal would be every bit as horrifying as what he had seen in the mirror all those years ago.

**Author's Note:**

> I had an idea and then it ran away from me. I hope you liked it.


End file.
